The Handmaid’s Tale recap: 'The Bridge'

The Handmaid's Tale

type

TV Show

genre

Drama, Sci-fi

run date

04/26/17

performer

Elisabeth Moss, Yvonne Strahovski, Joseph Fiennes, Samira Wiley

broadcaster

Hulu

Current Status

In Season

We gave it a B+

It’s this season’s penultimate episode, Gilead visitors. How are you feeling so far? The journey into this world has been both addictive and scarily relevant (go back and re-Google all the politically-hued pieces timed to the show’s debut; I’ll wait right here), and it does feel like we’re building to a boiling point.

Janine’s reached her threshold for what she can take: This place broke her. And it broke Moira too, for a while, but it now looks like she’s raising another glass to the revolution. (Hamilton probably doesn’t exist in the Gilead, but let’s pretend just for a second: “Raise a glass to freedom…”)

What happens when a handmaid fulfills her “sacred duty” and bears a healthy child? Another ceremony, one where she must give the baby she bore (conceived, let’s remember, as a result of government-sanctioned assault) to her commander and his wife. There’s a show made of her bowing to them, and the wife — not the man, of course, never the man — bowing back in a sign of equal respect. After she reluctantly hands the baby over, she exits the house for good, walking past a parade of her fellow handmaids as she goes to depart for her next posting. She spots Offred in the line, gives her a hug, and tells her friend that “he’s coming for me.”

Not the most reassuring of sendoffs. “Does she seem alright, considering?” Offred asks Aunt Lydia, who responds that our girl is “tougher than you think.” She takes Janine to her new home, where she’s no longer Ofwarren and is now hereby known as Ofdaniel.

As the handmaids disperse from the sending-off, Offred whispers to fellow handmaid Alma that she wants to help with Mayday. Alma plays dumb but brings it up again later when they’re away from potential eavesdroppers. There is something the resistance wants Offred to do: go back to Jezebels and help smuggle out an important package. Never mind how they know she was there last week, or what contraband they want her to take, but Offred agrees to try.

She goes to the Commander’s office that night and puts on a whole show of saying how nice it was when they went out on their “little adventure,” how exciting it was, and how much she enjoyed the thrill of getting there and what that they did after. He takes the bait and suggests they go later that night, after the rest of the house goes to sleep. Easy enough? Once Offred leaves, though, the confident facade crumbles — she gasps, the coy smile falls, and you see how scared she really was to try to con him. But they do get that encore, with Nick transporting them. Once inside, the Commander tells Nick they won’t be long — they’re just going straight up to the room this time. That doesn’t fit with Offred’s plan, so she asks if they can get a drink at the bar, but he remains noncommittal, and then annoyed when she asks again after they have sex. (Side note on that: After they finish, he tells Offred she doesn’t have to keep quiet when they’re at Jezebels, and she “can can be free.” Free is an interesting word choice here, considering Offred’s total lack of control in this world.)

He says he knows why she wanted to come back here — it’s to meet someone, and he’s already made the arrangements. He’s not wrong, but he’s got the wrong jezebel. When he opens the door to their room, in walks Moira. “You saw her the last time we were here,” he says, referring to her as Ruby and noting he “knows” her too. “I thought you’d welcome this little reunion.” After emphasizing they’re not that kind of friends, he makes them both thank him for this little get-together and leaves them to talk while he goes to shower off. Moira demands to know why she’d come back and risk herself for some little spy games. The package Alma asked for could be anything, she points out — a bomb, anthrax, who knows — and she refuses to help her get it. Offred is shocked at her friend’s reaction: The woman who carved messages of hope into walls and was brave enough to escape the Red Center has lost all hope. “Do not let them grind you down,” she tells Moira. “You keep your f—ing s— together. You fight.”

“I was doing all right until I saw you again,” Moira replies, and walks out the door, leaving a distraught Offred behind for the Commander to take back home.(Recap continues on page 2)